Toy



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3,044,213 TOY Gunars Licitis, Chicago, IlL, assignor to Marvin I. Glass,

Chicago, Ii]. 7

Filed Nov. 4, 1959, S'er. No. 850,918 7 Claims. (Q1. 46-177) This invention relates generally to a projectile toy and more particularly to a delayed-action projectile and an associated launching gun.

Children have long been fascinated by toy guns of various sorts and, accordingly, a great variety of toy guns have been developed which do a multitude of things.

Especially intriguing are those toy guns which not only launch a projectile with various contemporaneous side .eifects but which also provide later effects to represent the projectiles exploding when it reaches its designated target. Most of the existing toys of that type, however, require that the projectile contact some object to actuate In this invention no such contact isrequired; the explosive effect taking place a predetermined time interval'after the projectile is launched whether an object is contacted or not. Thus, the illusion of a fused or remote-controlled device is created. The latter feature is especially desirable in view of the current high degree of interest in remotely controlled devices, particularly missiles of various sorts.

Accordingly, the prime object of this invention is to provide an improved projectile launching toy in which a delayed eifect is produced without the necessity of the projectile contacting an object.

A further object is to provide such a toy in which the projectile and its launching gun cooperate to produce the delayed effect after the launching of the projectile.

A further object is to provide such a device which creates the effect of fused or remote-controlled operation but which is simple and economical.

Further objects and advantages of this device will be understood from the following description and accompanying drawings of one embodiment of the invention.

In the drawings:

FIGURE 1 is a side view (partially broken away) of a launching gun and a grenade-projectile mounted thereon in the ready-to-launch position, embodying various features of the invention.

FIGURE 2 is a sectional side view of the projectile shown in FIGURE 1 after it has been launched and has produced its delayed sound effect.

FIGURE 3 is a sectional side view of the projectile shown in FIGURE 1 in the ready-to-launch position.

FIGURE 4 is a sectional view taken along line 4-4 of FIGURE 1.

FIGURE 5 is a perspective view of the trigger member.

FIGURE 6 is a sectional view taken along line 66 of FIGURE 3. 7

FIGURE 7 is a sectional view taken along line 7--7 of FIGURE 3.

Briefly, in a toy in accordance with the invention, a launching gun propels a grenade-projectile, with the two combining to produce a build-up noise and a delayed explosion of the projectile a predetermined time interval after the projectile is launched.

Generally, the embodiment shown in FIGURE 1 includes a delayed-action grenade-projectile 10 and a launching gun 11. The gun 11, which is of an imaginative design in the general configuration of a carbine or sublease by a trigger mechanism 13. Loading the projectile into the barrel of the gun serves to set a portion of a sound-producing means in the projectile, as shown in FIG- ward into the launching chamber 21.

ing the sound-producing means to produce the appropriate noises which include build-up and explosion noises in this embodiment. Launching the projectile releases the energy but an inertia means 15 operates to delay the actuation of the sound-producingmeans and thereby interject a time interval between the launching of the grenade-projectile and its subsequent explosion.

To be more particular, the embodiment of the gun 11, shown in FIGURE 1, includes an elongated hollow barrel 16, and an integrally connected handle or stock 17. Externally, the gun is of a modernistic design and includes a telescopic sight 18' mounted on the top of the barrel 16. The handle 17 comprises a hollow depending forward grip portion 18 and a rear grip portion 19 which is connected 'to the forward grip portion 18 by a center portion 20.

The front end of the barrel 16 forms an internal cylindrical launching chamber 21 which receives the rear end of the projectile while the rear end of the barrel 16 forms an internal cavity 22 which extends back from the launching chamber 21 and houses the compression type launching spring 12. One end of the launching spring 12 is afiixed to the rear of the cavity 22 and in the relaxed, unloaded position its other end extends for- When the projectile is loaded in the launching chamber 21, as shown in FIGURE 1, its rear end acts against the launching spring 12 serving to compress it into the ready-to-launch position. The projectile is held in that position against the force of the launching spring 12 by the trigger mechanism 13.

The trigger mechanism 13 includes an elongated, generally horizontally movable trigger member 23, shown in FIGURE 5. The trigger member 23 carries an up- '32 at its rear end.

The trigger member 23 is mounted up into a slot 23a in the bottom of the rear end of the barrel 16, seen best in FIGURE 4. The guide pin 25 is slidably but loosely received in a rearward and downward extending guideway 25a'provi-ded by several projections 27 and 27' within the front portion 18 of the handle. The ears 26 and 26' and the lips 32' and 32' support the rear end of the trigger member 23 by riding above and below, respectively, the portion of the barrel 16 adjacent the slot 23a. A small flat spring 28 is held within the hollow handle portion 18 in a space defined by the projection 27 and the trigger member 23. The spring 28 supports the front end of the trigger member 23, urging it upward and causing the latch 24 to engage a lip 29 at the rear end of the projectile thereby holding the projectile in the readyto-launch position.

An annular finger loop 30 is integrally connected to the trigger member 23 and extends downwardly therefrom immediately in front of the rear portion 19 of the handle. When the loop 30 is pulled rearwardly, the trigger member 23 moves rearwardly while also pivoting about the contact point 31 of the ears 26 and 26 with the upper surface of portion of the barrel adjacent the slot 23a. The rear end of the trigger member 23 is prevented from lifting completely up by the lips 32 and 32' abutting up against the bottom surface of the portions of the barrel adjacent the slot 23a. The path of the triggermember 23 is defined by the sliding movement of the guide pin 25 within the guideway 25a and the movement of the ears 26 and 26' and the longitudinal lips 32 and 32' along the portion of the barrel adjacent the slot 23a.

ciently to be disengaged from the lip 29 of the projectile. The launching spring 12 then expands, propelling the unrestrcted projectile forward.

The grenade-projectile portion of the embodiment is shown in detail in FIGURES 2, 3, 6 and 7. Briefly, the sound-producing means includes a spring-loaded hammer 33 which explodes a cap 34 at a predetermined time to produce the desired explosion noise and a vibrating reed 55 and soundbox 56 which produce a build-up noise. A movable rack 35 carried by the projectile is biased rearwardly by a driving spring 36 when the projectile is disengaged from the gun. Then when the projectile is engaged with the gun in the ready-to-launch position, the rack 35 is forced by the gun to a forward position, placing the driving spring 36 in tension and causing a cam 37, which is carried on the front end of the rack 35, to set the hammer 33 in its ready-to-fire position. When the projectile is launched, the driving spring 36, which is thereby released, urges the rack 35 to its rear position, where the cam 37 releases the hammer 33 which fires the cap 34. The travel of the rack 35 rearwardly is retarded by an inertia Wheel 47 and its associated gears 48 and 49, and clutch 50, to porduce the desired delay period between the launching of the projectile and the noise representing its explosion. The rotation of the inertia wheel 47 which accompanies the rearward movement of the rack 35 excites the vibrating reed 55 and its associated soundbox 56 to produce a build-up noise to lead up to the simulated explosion.

To be more specific, the projectile comprises a hol low, elongated, generally cylindrical housing 37a and a frame 38 held theren. The housing 37a has a removable, blunted, conical nose section 39 (FIGURE 1) and an integral elongated cylindrical rear portion 40 which inserts into the launching chamber 21 of the gun and which has the circumferential lip 29 which, as noted above, engages with the latch 24 to maintain the projectile in the ready-to-launch position.

The rack 35 moves horizontally along the axis of the projectile on rails 41 which are secured to the frame 38. A pin 42, formed by a rearward extension of the rack 35 protrudes from the rear of the frame 38 into the rear portion 40 of the housing and abuts against the solid front plate 43 of a perforated piston 44 which is slidably received within the rear portion 40 of the housing.

The piston 44 is comprised of a solid front plate 43 and a solid rear plate 46 connected by four elongated strips 52 and it protrudes outwardly from the rear end of the rear portion 40 of the housing. The driving spring 36, which is a light duty compression spring, is carried on the pin 42 and abuts at its front end against the rear of the frame 38 and at its rear end against an abutment plate 45 integrally formed at the rear end of the pin 42 so as to urge the pin to a rearward position. The expansion of the spring 36 and the accompanying rearward travel of the pin 42 and piston 44 is limited. That limitation of travel is accomplished by having outwardly extending blocks 53, which are secured to the piston strips 52, abut inwardly extending lips 54, which are provided by the rear end 40 of the housing. The two springs 36 and 12 are so oriented that when the projectile is pushed into the barrel of the gun those springs are effectively abutted end-to-end. As the driving spring 36 is considerably lighter duty than the launching spring 12, when pressure is first applied only the lighter spring 36 is compressed. Then When the driving spring 36 has been compressed so that the rear plate 46 of the piston 44 solidly abuts the rear face of the rear portion 40 of the housing, further rearward pressure on the projectile serves to compress the launching spring 12.

Compressing the driving spring 36, advances the cam 37 to its forward position thereby setting the hammer 33 in the ready-to-fire position. The hammer 33 is a generally elongated member loosely pivoted at a point designated by the numeral 60 in FIGURES 2 and 3.

It carries a flat detonating head 62 at its front end and an extension 63- provided with an engaging lip 64 at its rear end. A coiled firing spring 66 biases the hammer 33 to rotate about its pivot point 60 in a counter-clockwise direction, and also to twist in the horizontal plane so that extension 63 and the engaging lip 64 are urged against the frame member 59 as indicated by the arrow in FIGURE 6. The firing spring 66 coils about the pivot point 60 of the hammer with one end 67 wrapped around the front end of the hammer 33 and the other end 69 abutted against a pin 71 protruding from the frame 38 A center extension 61, which extends downwardly from the hammer carries a cam-engaging-projection 68 which is oriented so that the cam 37, as it moves toward its forward position, will abut against it, rotating the hammer against the action of the firing spring 66, thereby causing the detonating head 62 to be raised and the lip 64 to slip over and engage with a lip 65 protruding from the frame member 59. The hammer 33 in this ready-tofire position is indicated in FIGURE 3 and the engaging lips 64 and 65 are shown in more detail in FIGURES 6 and 7.

After the projectile has been launched, by pulling the trigger mechanism 13 and allowing the stronger launching spring 12 to expand propelling the projectile forward, the rack 35 and cam 37 are freed from the force of that spring 12 and are moved rearwardly by the force of the weaker driving spring 42. As shown in FIGURE 6, the rear edge 72 of the cam 37 is beveled, to engage with the beveled forward edge 73 of the lip-carrying rear extension 63 of the hammer so that as the cam approaches its rearward position it pushes the extension 63 away from the frame member 59, disengaging lip 64 from lip 65. The firing spring 66 drives the detonating head 62 down upon the cap 34 with sufficient force to explode the latter. The cap 34 is positioned and supported upon an anvil 70 which is secured to the frame 38. The nose section 39 is removable to allow the child to position a cap 34 upon the anvil 70 before each launching of the projectile.

The time-delay between the launching of the projectile and the detonation of the cap, representing the projectiles explosion, is created by resisting the free rearward movement of the spring-driven rack 35. The resistance is accomplished by gearing the rack to the inertia wheel 47. The rack engages the small gear 48 which is coaxially mounted with a large one-way-clutch member 50. The function of the clutch 50 is to disengage the inertia Wheel 47 from the rack 35 during the latters forward motion so that the build-up noise maker is not excited during the loading of the projectile into the gun. A flexible finger 51 is connected to the small gear 48 and is oriented so as to engage internal notches in the clutch '50 only when the rack 35 moves rearward driving the small gear 48 in the counterclockwise direction. Thus, as the rack 35 moves forward the finger 51 slips over the notches in the clutch 50 and the clutch 50 is effectively disengaged from the small gear 48. Gear teeth around the periphery of the clutch 50 engage the teeth of the second small gear 49' which is coaxial with and integrally connected to the large inertia wheel 47. As the rack, when moving to a rearward position, is mechanically connected to the wheel 47, movement of the rack is restricted by the ability of the driving spring 36 to put the whole system including the wheel 47 into motion. Accordingly, as the magnitude of the force which is available to start the relatively large mass of the inertia wheel 47 moving is greatly reduced, by the chain of gears, from the magnitude of the initial spring force, the wheel 47 and thus the whole system is accelerated slowly.

With reference to the build-up noise produced prior to the simulated explosion, the inertia wheel 47 has peripheral teeth and the vibrating reed 55 is oriented so as to lie upon those teeth and be exited by them when the inertia wheel rotates. The reed 55 is afiixed to the sound box 56 which is in turn afiixed to the frame 38 and which picks up and amplifies the vibrations of the reed.

The length of the time interval may be varied considerably by changing a number of different factors without departing from the broad scope of the invention. Merely by way of example, several such factors are the length and characteristics of the driving spring 42.

Obviously, many other changes may be made in the embodimentherein described without departing from the scope of the invention. Various of the features of the invention believed useful and novel are set out in the following claims.

I claim:

1. In combination a delayed-action projectile and a gun for launching said projectile, said gun including a launching spring means and trigger means for disengaging said projectile from said gun, said projectile comprising a housing, sound-producing means contained in said housing, actuating means which are engageable with said sound producing means to actuate said sound-producing means, said actuating means including a driving spring means which abuts against said launching spring means thereby stressing both said spring means when said projectile is in engagement with said gun prior to the launching of said projectile, said launching spring means being stronger than said driving spring means so that when said projectile is released from engagement with said gun by said trigger means, said stressed launching spring means will propel said projectile away from said gun and said actuating means will be actuated through movement of said stressed driving spring means to engage said sound-producing means and to actuate said sound-producing means, and an inertia means which is connected in controlling relation to said actuating means and which operates to delay actuation of said sound-producing means by said actuating means for a length of time after said launching.

2. In combination a delayed-action projectile and a gun for launching said projectile, said projectile comprising a housing, sound-producing means contained in said housing, actuating means engageable with said sound-producing means for actuating said sound-producing means, and an inertia means which is connected to said actuating means and which operates to delay the actuation of said sound-producing means by said actuating means, said actuating means including amovable member which is movably held in said housing and which is movable to several positions, biasing means which engage said movable member thereby urging said movable member into a first position, said movable member being moved to and held in a second position against the force of said biasing means by being abutted against the front end of said gun'when said projectile is placed in engagement with said gun prior to launching'of said projectile from said gun, said movable member being free to move from said second position to said first position under force of said biasing means when said projectile is launched from said gun separating said movable member from its abutting engagement with the front end of said gun, said movable member engaging said sound-producing means when said movable member moves to said first position so as to actuate said'soundproducing means, said interia means being connected to said movable member so as 'to delay the movement thereof from said second to said first position whereby the actuation of said sound-producing means is delayed.

3. In combination a delayed-action projectile and a gun for launching said projectile, said projectile comprising a housing, sound-producing means contained in said housing, said sound-producing means including build-up noise-producing means and explosion-simulating means, actuating means in operating relationship with said sound-producing means for actuating said sound-producing means, and an inertia means which is connected to said actuating means and which operates to delay the actuation of said sound-producing means by said actuating means, said actuating means including a movable member, which is movably held in said housing and which is movable to several positions, biasing means which engage lsaid movable member thereby urging said movable member into a first position, said movable member being moved to and held in a second position against the .force of said biasing means by being abutted against the front end of said gun when said projectile is placed in engagement with said gun prior to launching of said projectile from said gun, said movable member being free to move from said second position to said first position under force of said biasing means when said projectile is launched from said gun separating said movable member from its abutting engagement with the front end of said gun, said movable member actuating said build-up noise-producing means as said movable member moves to said first position, said movable member engaging and thereby actuating said explosion-simulating means when said movable member reaches said first position, said inertia means being connected to said movable member 'so as to delay the movement thereof from said second to said first position whereby a time interval is created between the launching disengagement of said projectile and the actuation of said explosion-simulating means.

4. A projectile toy comprising, in combination, a de layed-action projectile and a launcher for launching said projectile, said projectile comprising a frame having thereon means for producing a build-up sound, and other means for producing a climactic sound, drive means placed in operation by the launching of said projectile to actuate said means producing the build-up sound, and to actuate the means producing said climactic sound after a period of operation of said means producing the build-up sound, and time delaying means controlling said drive means to retard its operation to prolong the production of said build-up sound and to delay the occurrence of said climactic sound.

5. A projectile toy comprising, in combination, a delayed-action projectile and a launcher for launching said projectile, said projectile comprising a frame, soundproducing means supported on said frame, drive means supported on said frame for actuating said sound-producing means, said drive means being placed in operation by the launching of said projectile, said'drive means including means for storing energy and movable means movable by therenergy storing means when said energy storing means releases energy to actuate said sound-producing means, and time delaying means for controlling said movable means to retard its movement to delay the occurrence of said sound.

-6. A projectile toy comprising, in combination, a delayed-action projectile and a gun for launching said projectile, said projectile comprising a housing, soundproducing means contained in said housing, drive means contained in said housing for actuating said sound-producing means, said drive means being placed in operation by the disengagement of said projectile from said gun incident to the launching of said projectile, said drive means including a spring for storing energy and a movable member movable by the spring when said spring releases energy to actuate said sound-producing means, and inertia means for controlling said movable member to retard its movement to delay the occurrence of said sound.

7. A projectile toy comprising, in combination, a de-, layed-action projectile and a launcher for-launching said projectile, said projectile comprising a frame, sound-producing means supported on said frame, latching means connected to said sound-producing means to prevent operation thereof, said sound-producing means operating to produce a sound upon release of said latching means, operating means connected to release said latching means and actuated by the launching of said projectile from said launcher, and time delaying means associated with said operating means in controlling relation thereto to delay 7 8 substantially the release of said latching means following 1,063,095 Wieser May 27, 1913 launching of said projectile, thereby to delay the produc- 1,285,287 McDaniel Nov. 19, 1918 tion of the sound by said sound-producing means. 2,685,253 Apotheloz 1 Aug. 3, 1954 2,872,866 Brown et al. Feb. 10, 1959 References Cited 1n the file of th1s patent 5 2,897,630 Horowitz et a1 Aug 4, 1959 UNITED STATES PATENTS 972,425 Wilson et a1 Oct. 11, 1910 

